Lt. Gov. Daniel Mongiardo said Tuesday that he is “not taking a position” in the U.S. Senate race between Democrat Jack Conway and Republican Rand Paul.

“I have spoken with Jack Conway the week after election day and haven’t heard from him since,” Mongiardo said Tuesday night before speaking at the Community Action Council’s Poverty Forum in downtown Lexington.

Mongiardo, a physician from Hazard, was defeated by Conway in the Democratic primary last month by less than 1 percentage point.

Mongiardo also said he is not making plans for a gubernatorial run next year.

“I just got out of a heated campaign. The last thing on my mind is another campaign,” Mongiardo said.

Gov. Steve Beshear plans to seek a second term in 2011, but he has chosen Louisville Mayor Jerry Abramson as his running mate because Mongiardo entered the race for the U.S. Senate seat now held by retiring Sen. Jim Bunning, R-Southgate.

No, Mongiardo is not stupid. He just can’t bring himself to support a Louisville liberal whose views are not in the best interests of the average everyday Kentuckians from whence Mongiardo comes. Plus he’s angry over some of the things that happened in the campaign, I’m guessing. Why should he endorse a candidate he doesn’t like just because he’s in the same party?

Being from Perry County myself, Mongardio probably wanted Conway to pay off campaign debt for him and Conway laughed or something. Thats how they do it in the mountains.
Mongardio will become a has been if he does not grow up.

Dan is really a republican anyway thats why he wont support him. During the primary he tried to turn it into a rural vs urban debate and it didnt work out. I live in Floyd,Co and voted for Conway. If Dems wanted to vote republican they would and guess what they dont thats why he lost. Conway doesnt need him.

If you’re a political junkie like me, you would be well served by watching Comment on Kentucky on KET. Last week, Ronnie Ellis discussed what I would imagine is a major stumbling block to an endorsement of Jack Conway by Lt. Gov. Mongiardo. It would appear in the days after the election, Mongiardo was considering a request to recanvas. An offer was made by the Conway camp to clear Mongiardo’s campaign debt, if he did not ask for a recanvas. As we all know, no recanvas was requested. However, the campaign debt has not been cleared by the Conway campaign. If I were Mongiardo, I doubt I would be interested in endorsing someone who had made commitments to me and not fulfilled them. In the big city, personal commitments may be something only chumps make good. In the mountains, they are still taken very seriously. Your word is your bond.

Instead of jumping all over the Lt. Gov. for not endorsing Jack Conway, let’s ask ourselves why? Jack Conway has given his word. This is a very public test of that word and so far he has failed. Right now Jack Conway needs Lt. Gov. Mongiardo, the reverse is not true. Jack needs to start acting like a Senate candidate and less someone who thinks he is owed this seat and genuinely put out that he has to work for it.

I couldn’t agree with “Poor Jackie” more….everyone piles on the same way…its all about Conway , if there was a committment made it had better be kept, and the sooner the better/

Rand Paul may seem like a fringe politician to Conway supporters, but Kentuckians exhibit less than rational political choices on a regular basis. The polls have shown Paul in the lead, Conway needs something more than he has now, and Mongiardo got 200,000+ votes..that would be a start….get off your high horse and kiss and make up JACK

For real. If this was the other way around and it was Mongirado supporting Conway and Grayson refusing to support Paul; we’d be getting piles of breathless media reports on a non-united Republican party.

[…] Conway’s vanquished rival in that primary, Lt. Governor Dan Mongiardo, has decided that he will not endorse either candidate in the 2010 general election. From the looks of things, though, this does not look […]

Oh please. Many of the commenters on here are talking as if there definitely was a deal between Conway and Mongiardo to retire Dan’s campaign debt. All we have as evidence is one person saying that this was the case, and we’re off to the races. No one knows for sure if Conway actually made such a promise to Mongiardo. And really, that was one of the nastiest campaigns amongst Dems in Ky in a long time. I doubt that Conway is feeling all that generous to Mongiardo to make such a promise– smells like sour grapes with spin to boot.

My take is that Mongiardo is a big baby who can’t get over losing. I met him. He’s not a very nice person. Plenty ego though– enough said.

[…] primary: Conway’s vanquished rival in that primary, Lt. Governor Dan Mongiardo, has decided that he will not endorse either candidate in the 2010 general election. From the looks of things, though, this does not look […]

[…] Conway’s vanquished rival in that primary, Lt. Governor Dan Mongiardo, has decided that he will not endorse either candidate in the 2010 general election. From the looks of things, though, this does not look […]

[…] primary: Conway’s vanquished rival in that primary, Lt. Governor Dan Mongiardo, has decided that he will not endorse either candidate in the 2010 general election. From the looks of things, though, this does not look […]

[…] primary: Conway’s vanquished rival in that primary, Lt. Governor Dan Mongiardo, has decided that he will not endorse either candidate in the 2010 general election. From the looks of things, though, this does not look […]